Bandcamp is an online music distribution platform founded in 2008 byOddpost co-founder Ethan Diamond and programmers Shawn Grunberger, Joe Holt and Neal Tucker,[1][2][3][4] with an office and record store inOakland, California.[5] Acquired byEpic Games in March 2022, the company was sold toSongtradr in 2023.[6]
Bandcamp was founded in 2008 by Ethan Diamond (CEO) and programmers Shawn Grunberger (CFO), Joe Holt and Neal Tucker. In 2019, Bandcamp opened its first office and record store inOakland, California.[5]
In 2010, the site enabled embedding in other websites and shared links on social media sites.[7]
As of August 2020[update], half of Bandcamp's revenue was from sales for physical products.[8]
In November 2020, Bandcamp launched Bandcamp Live, a ticketedlive-streaming service for artists. The service is an integrated feature of the Bandcamp website. Fees on tickets were waived until March 31, 2021, and became 10% from then.[9][10]
Bandcamp providesvinyl pressing services for artists. After a 50-artist pilot in 2020, the company opened limited access to 10,000 artists in early 2021 with plans for further expansion. Their fans preorder the pressing rather than having the artist fund it upfront. Bandcamp lets artists set their own price. The company's two million vinyl sales in 2020 doubled that of 2019.[11]
Bandcamp was acquired byEpic Games on March 2, 2022.[12] Epic said the platform "will play an important role in Epic's vision to build out a creator marketplace ecosystem...". Ethan Diamond said "Bandcamp will keep operating as a stand-alone marketplace and music community...".[13]
Bandcamp's employees voted to form a union via theOffice and Professional Employees International Union in March 2023.[14][15] On September 28, 2023, Epic Games announced that it was laying off 870 people, roughly 16% of its workforce. As part of this, Bandcamp was sold toSongtradr, another music platform.[16] According to an Epic Games spokesperson, Songtradr incrementally offered employment to the Bandcamp staff.[17] However, several employees were locked out of their systems and faced uncertainty over their jobs. After the acquisition was completed on October 16, Songtradr stated that only 60 of Bandcamp's previously 118 workers had been offered a contract.[18] Songtradr fired most of the staff involved in forming the unionization, as well as the ones that were helping to negotiate fair terms.[15] In an internal email, Songtradr's CEO, Paul Wiltshire, said that Bandcamp's financial state had "not been healthy" due to increased operating costs over steady revenues, despite the site's continuous profitability.[18] In response to the layoffs, users and artists of the platform expressed anxiety about its future.[19][20] As of December 2023[update], Songtradr had not formally recognized the Bandcamp union.[21]
Artists and labels upload music to Bandcamp and control how they sell it, setting their own prices, offering users the option to pay more,[22] and selling merchandise.
Users can download their purchases or stream their music on the Bandcamp application or website only once or, by preserving the purchase voucher, unlimited times. They can also send purchased music as a gift,[23] view lyrics, and save individual songs or albums to a wish list. Uploading music to Bandcamp is free. The company takes a 15% commission on sales made from their website, which drops to 10% after an artist's sales surpassUS$5,000, pluspayment processing fees.[24]
Downloads are offered inlossy formatsMP3 (LAME, 320k or V0),AAC andOgg Vorbis, and in lossless formatsFLAC,ALAC,WAV andAIFF.[25] In addition to digital downloads artists may offer to sell their music on physical media such asCD orvinyl.
Bandcamp's website offers users access to an artist's page, with information on the artist, social media links, merchandising links and listing their available music. Artists can change the look of their page and customize its features.[26]
During theCOVID-19 pandemic, in 2020 Bandcamp announced that they would be waiving their share of revenue and donating all sales to artists for 24 hours on March 20.[27] They repeated the initiative in the following months[28] and began calling these days "Bandcamp Fridays";[29] they are scheduled once every month and the websiteIs It Bandcamp Friday?[30] was established to provide timing clarity to those outside thePacific Time Zone. After raising more than $40 million for its musicians in 2020 through Bandcamp Fridays, the platform extended the program to four additional dates in 2021.[31]
In response to theprotests that took place following themurder of George Floyd and other African Americans who had died from police violence, Bandcamp announced that for 24 hours on June 19, 2020 they would donate 100% of profits to theNAACP Legal Defense Fund.[32]
Also, in response to the Southern California wildfires of January 2025, Bandcamp announced that they would donate all of their proceeds from February 7th toMusiCares to support those affected by it.[33]
Bandcamp gained much attention in July 2010 whenAmanda Palmer, Low Places and Bedhed gave up theirrecord labels and started selling albums on Bandcamp, usingTwitter for promotion.[34][35]Will Toledo initially released his 2011 studio albumTwin Fantasy on Bandcamp.
In December 2014, Bandcamp for Labels was launched. Popular independent labels such asSub Pop,Fat Wreck Chords,Relapse Records andEpitaph Records launched their own Bandcamp pages.[43] In November 2019,Peter Gabriel added his complete solo catalog to Bandcamp.[44] On June 18, 2020,Björk published her discography on the platform.[45] In December, UK labelWarp joined Bandcamp; this made records byHudson Mohawke,Aphex Twin,Kelela and other artists available on the platform.[46] On October 21, 2021,Radiohead published their discography on the platform.[47]
In the summer of 2016, their editorial content was expanded by launchingBandcamp Daily, an online music publication about artists on the platform.[48][49] The publication is based in New York.[5] Its managing editor was jj skolnik, a writer forPitchfork,BuzzFeed andThe New York Times, as well as former author ofpunk zines.[50] They were made redundant in October 2023.[51] AmongBandcamp Daily's columnists have been writers ofWired,[52]Vice,[53]NPR Music,[54]Pitchfork[55] andPaste.[56]
On August 4, 2017, the staff ofBandcamp Daily donated all of the day's sales proceeds to theTransgender Law Center, a civil rights organization fortransgender people.[57]
In February 2018, the audience ofBandcamp Daily had increased by 84% since the previous year.[49][58]
